What is IT?

A look at how IT works in today’s corporate marketplace, and how it is changing in your business.

When people think about Information Technology (IT), there is a tendency to reduce it to computers, printers, and the person on the end of the phone at your office who advises you ‘to turn it off and on again’. But IT these days is, and can be, so much more than this narrow definition, and understanding the potential of fully-realised IT systems, and harnessing their potential, could be the deciding factor in putting your business on the path to success.

IT is concerned with all aspects of managing and processing information within a business. It is very often used to just describe computers and computer networks, but in reality it is far more layered and complex, covering a variety of systems throughout an organisation, including the physical computing hardware, networks, operating systems and software, storage, and databases. An IT department’s remit usually also covers some aspects of telecommunications; certainly the internet, and often business telephones.

But even with a wider understanding of what constitutes IT, there is a tendency to underuse its potential, or see it as a necessary evil in the day-to-day running of an organisation. However, it is essential to start seeing IT as more than this, a far larger, more helpful and even essential piece of the puzzle that makes up a successful organisation than how most businesses think of it today.

IT should be a lynchpin of an organisation, considered as part of its core technology, which ensures that a business’s technology runs smoothly and becomes a help, rather than a hindrance to the efficient and effective running of an organisation. This, in turn, frees you up to focus on emerging technology. At this point, when a business is able to focus on developing emerging tech for themselves, IT is no longer a ‘cost’ associated with the organisation, but begins to have the potential to be a profit-making department itself.

In a modern business, IT should be central to the organisation, in terms of strategic planning, growth, and income. Vital for the smooth functioning of communications, data storage, and inventory, not to mention information management, the successful leveraging of the potential of information technology is crucial for a business to be successful, to grow, and even just to survive. Changing the way we look at IT, and bringing it into the core of a business’s functions is key to riding the digital wave across all industries in the modern marketplace.

Ultimately, in the current market technology moves and changes at an extraordinarily fast pace. It is absolutely essential for a business that wants to do more than just stand still to be able to keep up, and even ahead of these rapid evolutionary shifts. At the end of the day, the best way to do that is to have a genuine expert dedicated at all times to scanning the horizon, and keeping your company on top of the changes in tech, communication and information. This is exactly how an IT department should work in a modern organisation, and why these days, continued investment in IT is crucial.

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